


[Un]Happy Hour

by caffeineivore



Category: Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon | Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon
Genre: Alternate Universe - Bar/Pub, Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Drinking, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Multi, Vignettes, searching for redemption, star crossed lovers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-28
Updated: 2018-10-28
Packaged: 2019-08-08 18:30:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16434587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/caffeineivore/pseuds/caffeineivore
Summary: Four Couples. Four Drinks. Four Bar Scenes. AU vignettes. Star-crossed lovers will be star-crossed lovers. Flashfic variations to a theme written through the course of a few years and a few different special occasions.





	1. Manhattan

The bartop is chestnut polished to a dark red gleam and the walls are dark wood and gleaming mirrors. There are no working men clad in denim and work boots shouting at televisions over cheap domestics here, nor scantily-clad shot girls tucking wrinkled singles into bras. But it's busy, glittering with low lights reflecting off of countless glasses and bottles, the sheen of silk and sophistication. Jeffries-- first name unused and immaterial-- nurses a rocks glass full of Irish whiskey and hunches over the glossy surface of the bar, but he knows she's there way before he hears the click of stiletto heels on the ebony floors or smells a whiff of jasmine by his left ear. 

She completely ignores him and takes the Manhattan from the barkeep, a svelte femme fatale in black satin, blood-red lipstick imprinting the rim of the cocktail glass. Jeffries clenches both hands around a too-small cup so that he doesn't do something foolish and oh-so-easy. Like yank on that long, raven hair until her eyes meet his. Or wrap them around her gorgeous white throat and squeeze. Or cup the back of that arrogantly perfect head and guide those lips towards his own. 

As usual, she makes the first move, with all the sick confidence of someone who knows and only-somewhat-cares that he has no power to resist. Just a subtle shift of her hips, an innocuous lean on the bartop, and her jet black hair is sliding like an oil spill over his forearm, ends tickling his thigh. Even through layers of clothing, he feels the heat as though each strand is a lick of black flame. And he knows that despite his best efforts and the low lights, she can see his Adam's apple bob as he gulps down Irish and unwilling titillation. And in the mirror behind the myriad bottles in the back of the bar, he can see the reflection of her smile.

"Long time no see, Gavin," Smooth as silk, warm and bittersweet like the perfect blend of rye and vermouth, and only she calls him by his given name any more. He tries for the coldest tone he can muster.

"Not long enough, Renee." Jeffries knocks back the rest of his drink, and the burn of the whiskey feels like the taste of red lipstick and an empty bed, the crash of broken glass against a concrete wall. Last time, she left scratches down his back with her nails, disappearing before dawn. The announcement of her high-profile engagement to a politician made the newspaper that very day. And _that_ stabbed a bit deeper into his back than her manicure.

"You're angry. I guess you have a right." Her tone is carelessly indifferent, and he doesn't look up into her eyes to verify it. If there's a hint of humanity in that amethyst gaze, he'd really be doomed. He sure as hell can't afford it. "But we can still have a drink for old times' sake."

"You sure your soon-to-be husband would want that?" Jeffries scoffs, even as the bartender sets another whiskey in front of him. He drains it in two angry, burning gulps. The sleazebag she's marrying is an old-money corporate lawyer and a shoo-in for his precinct's congressional elect. Funding for schools and public safety has never been so at risk-- but then again, what the hell would they care? One pair of the good congressman's shoes probably costs more than the average Brooklyn middle-class schmuck made in a month. 

She slaps the almost-empty cocktail glass down hard enough for droplets of rye to splatter and mar the otherwise-immaculate bartop. And then she reaches over and yanks. Their lips meet halfway, a sloppy clatter of teeth and tongues and the burn of whiskey and frustration. He can't pull away any more than a drowning man could let go of the rope that would tug him to shore. And it's not even ten minutes later that finds a crumpled wad of bills on the bartop where his whiskey was and the two of them nowhere in sight. The bartender shrugs; it's Manhattan, and business is business. The money of a high-stakes affair spends as green as any other. And besides, he's not sure he wants to know.

The next morning finds Jeffries in his flat, softly and viciously cursing to the bare walls as he fights a hangover and a few new scratches down his back. Renee is long gone, as usual, and later that day he would find a forgotten black lace thong mocking him in the backseat of his car, from the first time the night before, frantic and rushed and heady and nowhere near a civilized room or bed. And just as the last time, and the time before that, and the time before that, he will promise himself to stay away from her and the slow-burning poison of their ill-fated love affair. 

And when he finishes telling himself that, and looks up after splashing cold water on his face, he'll see his reflection in the mirror. And just as the last time, and the time before that, and the time before that, it will show the lie of it hiding behind his eyes.


	2. Martini

The lounge is all gilt-edged glamour, with its marble mosaic floor and the golden accents on the tables and walls, picked up like a sunlit reflection on tawny bottles of cognac and pearlescent flutes of champagne. There is no crush of bodies, no flashing lights. It is expansive and lush as a Californian sunset, and the few who do mill about are all impeccably dressed and turned out. Men in French cologne and Italian suits whisper lies and sweet nothings to women in diamonds worth a well-off annual salary and plastic surgery worth twice that. And yet, he spots his mark the moment he walks in.

She's standing by herself, languidly holding a champagne flute as her cornsilk hair shimmers under the lamplight. She blends in perfectly-- black silk couture cocktail dress, studiously casual expression of polite boredom, fabulous chandelier earrings. Of course, he has a full dossier on her, complete with driver's license photo. But still, there's something about her that sets her apart from all the rest of the beautiful, indolent corrupt in the room. He approaches, but with as much understated indifference as she.

"Gin martini, dry." 

At that, she cocks her head to the side, chuckles, and the sound feels like champagne bubbles as it vibrates close to his ear. "Isn't that what James Bond drinks?"

"I think he drinks it with vodka." He gives her a carefully-rehearsed smile. "Kenneth Westerberg. And you are?"

"Marlene Abel. It's nice to meet you. Are you new to Los Angeles?"

He would be, to her world, even though he's lived in the City of Fallen Angels for as long as he can remember. "Yeah, moved here from Chicago last year. Helluva improvement in the weather, that's for damn sure."

The champagne bubble laughter tinkles again, closer this time. "We get that a lot. What do you do, Mr. Moved-Here-From-Chicago?"

"Commercial Real Estate. God, that sounds boring," he answers, and he spends a few minutes sharing bits and pieces of the life that has been carefully created for him with meticulous nonchalance. Kenneth Westerberg grew up in an affluent home in Connecticut, went to Yale, then worked in Chicago for five years before relocating to the West Coast. He enjoys tennis and watching football, speaks three languages, and has impeccable taste in alcohol and women alike. "Anyway, call me Ken."

"All right. Ken." She clinks her glass against his, and her smile almost looks genuine. "To the start of a beautiful friendship."

He watches her out of the corner of his eye as he sips his martini. It would be simple to express interest, strike up a friendship, get close to her. It would be necessary. He is the best at what he did, and she wouldn't ever find out a thing about Kenneth Westerberg to contradict what he told her. 

All of the sudden, her eyes meet his, unguarded and blue as the Pacific ocean on a sunny day. And the regret is colder and sharper than the gin in his glass. Maybe, just maybe, she wasn't involved in any of it.

He discreetly takes a step back when a movie-star-handsome blond struts up to her and kisses her full on the lips, giving her butt a squeeze with one hand even as he snags a flute of champagne for himself with the other. Ken knows who he is, of course. Adrian Brigham, codename Ace, one of the biggest drug kingpins on the Los Angeles narcotics scene. But he waits for an introduction.

"Darling, this is Ken from Chicago. Ken, my fiance, Adrian."

Ken drains the rest of the martini and allows the enemy to take his hand as he sizes up his quarry and talks about the Superbowl. Handsome in a smooth golden-boy way, perfect teeth and tan. No one would expect that such a harmless package hid such dark secrets. The last raid of one of Ace's operations turned up half a million in cocaine and five people dead in the shootout, including a cop with two school-aged children and a female bystander, aged seventeen. Ace does not know, yet, that his days are numbered.

But irrationally, Ken wishes that Marlene's weren't, too.

And even more irrationally, he wishes that he could tell her that his name isn't really Kenneth Westerberg, and actually mean it when he clinks his glass against hers.


	3. Mojito

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Every life has one true love snapshot.” - Mitch Albom, The Five People You Meet In Heaven

It’s not much of a bar, really. There are no pool tables, no jukeboxes playing twangy country songs about love gone wrong. There are no dance or karaoke stages, no busty shot girls, not even four full walls. The sign overhead is in simple block letters, not a hint of neon lighting to be seen. _The Crossroads_ is an unobtrusive little oasis in the midst of O’Hare’s busy terminals, and Zavier, though he meets and serves people from all walks of life, keeps himself separate from them– a polite arms’ length at all times. He doesn’t doubt that they all have fascinating histories and tales to tell, but it’s better and safer this way.

He’s just cashing out a harried-looking businessman whose death grip on his iPad wasn’t ever relinquished, even for a second, through the course of two Sazerac’s, when she walks in.

Zavier’s first impression of her is understated class. Quietly expensive sapphire studs in her ears. A slim silver wrist-watch. Her carry-on luggage matches her purse precisely, though neither are emblazoned with flashy hardware or designer labels. A slim figure in a dark blue cashmere coat. Black hair. A heart-shaped face that is all sad blue eyes. Nervous hands with sensibly short nails.

Ten years ago, she would have meant not much more to him than one picked pocket or brandished switchblade away from quick cash.

Now, something about her catches his attention.

“I’d like a glass of Sancerre, please,” she tells him as she takes a seat at the bar. “Or just– I don’t know– whatever dry white wine you have available.”

She looks young– early twenties, perhaps a few years younger than himself– but that’s not the only reason he quirks a smile and asks for ID. The driver’s license shows her name to be _Anderson, Amy M._ ,with an address in one of the ritzy towers on North Lake Shore Drive, aged twenty-two as of September 10th. She looks up into his face and he swears that he can feel the faint scar– the location of a former teardrop tattoo and a souvenir of the fateful knife-fight eight years back that had landed him in prison– on his left cheekbone throbbing.

Instead, he focuses on her, cocks his head to the side. “You don’t seem so sure of what you want.”

“Well, I’m not too much for the party scene, I’m afraid,” Amy M. Anderson murmurs, fiddles with the leather handle of her purse. “I’ve had wine on a few formal occasions, and I know that I like white better than red. I wouldn’t know what to order otherwise, you see? And… this sounds so terrible, but I think I just need a little… boost, if you will. To get on the plane.”

“I’ll make you something nice,” he tells her gently. “You’re usually one who knows what you want, I think. But this– as you say– this isn’t quite your scene.” He picks up a clean highball glass and some lime, some mint leaves. Something about her cool, fresh beauty suits a drink with a bit more class, takes a bit more skill, than a typical, ordinary fruity concoction. Many bartenders dislike making mojitos– there is such a delicate balance when muddling mint and limes to release their essence without damaging them– they take too much time and effort. The drink he slides across the bar a few moments later sparkles, brilliantly green mint leaves and lime wedges in perfect suspension in the iced soda and rum. She takes a cautious sip, then smiles faintly up into his equally green eyes.

“It’s good,” Amy M. Anderson says as she takes another sip. “You’re good at this. How did you guess? You must have a lot of experience working in bars.”

Zavier chuffs out a soft, self-deprecating laugh. “Not exactly. That is a long, boring story. Not good for a busy airport. Where are you headed?”

“Baltimore,” she answers, taking another sip of her drink. “I’m in my first year of medical school there, at Hopkins.” Another sad, sweet smile. “My plane’s running a bit late due to the weather, but that’s not really why I came here for a– what is this drink called, by the way?”

“Mojito,” Zavier answers. Medical school in Baltimore. A North Side address. For all they might be residents of the same city, it’s a completely different world. And yet he has the oddest feeling that if she knew, she’d never judge him. Nonetheless, he has never been so grateful that the job requires long sleeves. “It’s made with rum and mint, mainly. And medical school is hard. I don’t think it’s unusual to be nervous.”

“It’s not the courseload,” Amy murmurs, staring down into the glass. “I have never been fazed by hard work, or difficult material. It’s just… not quite what I expected. None of my friends are going to school there. I’m okay with being alone, most of the time, but…” A sigh softer than a snowflake landing on a windowsill, “I never expected medical students to be so– so arrogant, so elitist. We’re supposed to be the best of the best, studying at the top school to learn how to do good work and save lives. Instead, some of them will actually go out of their way to sabotage each other to make themselves look better. One girl in one of my classes had all of her notes for a whole term shredded.”

The cutthroat mentality, unfortunately, is one that Zavier knows all too well. In the mean streets of the South Side, it had been a way to stay safe– attack before you are attacked, gain equally mean and untrustworthy peers for the protection of numbers. In prison, it had been a way to buck the system, to gain the respect of other inmates. Being hard often meant the difference between survival and destruction– hitting first meant you were left alone. Any act of disrespect or defiance demanded retribution, and the cycle could be never-ending.

He watches her finish her drink as he ponders what to say. “You can’t let that get to you,” he finally says, idly wiping down the scant length of the bar. His fingers almost brush hers. “That way lies trouble. I know that many times, it’s easier to be angry than to be peaceful. Stay away from those sorts and protect yourself, but– know that you’re better. And know that you will make it.” He takes her empty glass and meets her gaze, and smiles– not the typical customer-service smile– but as though trying to reassure her that there were still good things in the world– cool drinks and spotlessly white snowfall and a future where she’ll save lives and he… he’ll perhaps make something of himself. There’s less than a foot between their faces– he has no right to come any closer. So he straightens and wills himself not to stare at the way the rum brings a flush to her cheeks. “Someday, you’ll save those lives and help all the people whom you’ve always wanted to help. And everything else won’t matter.”

She cocks her head to the side and returns his smile, and he has the feeling he’s seeing something rare and precious as her lips quirk up. “You’re quite wise,” she says softly. “I don’t think you’re much older than I am, but you seem like you know a lot. Met a lot of people, experienced a lot of things.”

“Yes.” He doesn’t elaborate. She wouldn’t be shocked and appalled, he doesn’t think, but it is precisely the trust in those wide blue eyes that has him feeling ashamed of his past. Trust isn’t something often handed to him– he can count with the fingers on one hand the number of people who’ve truly trusted him in his twenty-four years. And never before had it been so easily, willingly given. “I… I suppose I’m pretty good at reading people.” Not really in the best of ways, though, and he can’t bring himself to admit it to her.

“That’s a skill I wish I had more of,” she laughs softly. “Well, I appreciate the pep talk,” Amy M. Anderson reaches into her tidy purse, slides an American Express across the counter. Her signature belies the stereotype of doctors and their terrible handwriting, and she leaves a generous tip. She puts the card back into her wallet, but proffers a slim hand. “Thank you– and, oh, I never did catch your name.”

“Zavier. Zavier Reyes.” Despite the winter gloom outside and the chilled glass she’d been holding, her hand is warm and soft in his. On impulse, instead of shaking it, he brings her hand up to his lips for a kiss, and is then charmed at the way her cheeks flush crimson. “Perhaps we’ll meet again.”

“I– I’d like that,” she draws back and picks up her things. “Thank you, again.” She gets up from her seat, but instead of leaving right away, stands by the stool for a moment and smiles. “I feel a bit better now. Maybe someday I’ll be able to return the favour.”

He doesn’t let that give him any sort of hope, but he meets her gaze and nods. “Have a safe flight, Miss Anderson.”

“Amy.” With that, she makes her way out of _The Crossroads_ , and he watches her until she disappears around a corner. He glances up at the big blue screen which lists all incoming and outgoing domestic flights, notes the estimated time of arrival for the next one out to Baltimore, and temporarily puts it out of his mind as he pulls a Budweiser draft for his next customer.

He doesn’t let himself think about it until he finishes his shift, and makes his way from O’Hare to the South Side on the Blue Line. It’s a long trip on a mostly empty train, and it’s easy for his mind to wander. Amy has no idea that the long sleeves of his shirt conceal old gang tattoos, or that he is on the final year of his probation. When she was probably busy studying for her PSATs, he was getting sentenced to five years in prison after pleading guilty to assault with a deadly weapon after a gang fight gone south as opposed to getting charged with attempted murder. Undoubtedly, she’d spent her senior year of high school interviewing with colleges, while he’d spent a good three months of what would have been his in Administrative Segregation in a prison six hours away from Chicago, angry and defiant and unrepentant, getting into fights and running the illicit tobacco racket on the inside.

It had been an ambush by two older, harder felons armed with homemade shanks which had landed him in the hospital wing for more than a month. He’d woken up to see Warden Shana Maynard sitting in a chair by the cot, looking down at him with inscrutable dark eyes.

“You know, Reyes, there’s only one route for you if you keep doing things the way you’re doing right now.” She doesn’t mince words. “I’ve seen people die in here. They’re oftentimes too young, too healthy, to go when they do. It’s never pretty.” Briskly, she hands him a water cup from the stand next to the cot. His hands are chained to the railing, so she holds it so he can sip through the straw. “You almost did, you know. They stabbed you five times. Twenty-seven stitches total, and one of the cuts missed your heart by an inch. You keep doing this, your luck will run out real quick.”

He can’t hold that searing, intense gaze, and looks away. His eyes land on a book on the stand. Hers follow, and out of the corner of his eye, he can see an enigmatic smile.

“It’s called _Terra Nostra_ – Our Earth. It’s written by a Mexican author– I think you’ll like it. Learn something about your world, be proud of your roots. I’m leaving it here with you.” Usually, when dealing with particularly difficult prisoners, there are at least three officers on hand when handcuffs are removed. Perhaps the Warden is foolish, or just very brave. Instead of calling in any COs, she stands, an elegant woman in a dark suit who’d look more at home in a boardroom than anywhere associated with the Illinois Department of Corrections, then reaches over Zavier’s wrist and unlocks them herself. “Think about what you’re doing with the rest of your life, Reyes. You’re not even eighteen yet. Don’t be stupid and throw it all away.”

He ends up cracking the book open out of sheer boredom a few hours later. And then doesn’t set it down until lights-out. During his recovery, almost miraculously, a new book would always appear on the nightstand just as he’d be close to finishing the old one. And when he was moved back to his cell, there was a copy of Dostoyevsky’s _Crime and Punishment_ that had not been there before waiting for him.

By the time that he had been up for parole, he’d managed to get his GED and a good start on college-level courses. It had been the Warden who’d introduced him to Damien Churchill, who would become his parole officer, and then Damien who’d found him a job and a place to live.

Now, Zavier disembarks from the Clark-Lake stop on the Blue Line and transfers to the Orange Line, which will take him the rest of the way home. The Osa-P Jewelry Store in Chinatown is only a few blocks down Cermak from his old haunts, but the area is free of graffiti and drive-by shootings. Nonetheless, he wonders sometimes that Mrs. Oh, his landlady, trusts him not to case the place. It’s one of many small mercies that he’s grateful for but has little right to expect, at least not yet.

The snow falls silently outside as he leaves the station, and a nearby clock chimes the hour. Amy M. Anderson, with her delicate hands and her clear, soft eyes, would be in Baltimore by now. Zavier stuffs his hands into his pockets as he treks the few blocks to his flat, and wistfully thinks of his mother’s injunction– every Sunday when he visits her– to find himself a nice girl.

He has no right to think of the lovely, wistful Amy M. Anderson in that way, because she’s making something of herself, and it is bordering on sacrilege for someone so tainted to crave something so pure. Indeed, she’s just one of countless people who pass through _The Crossroads_ in O’Hare. He may never see her again.

The wind picks up, and perhaps it is his imagination, but he can almost catch a whiff of fresh peppermint, cool and bracing, and he straightens and quickens his steps. He may never see her again, but if he does, hopefully it will be in a time and place where he can look into her eyes without shame.

_Someday…_


	4. Margarita

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Blood Pact
> 
> I am not perfect.
> 
> I am sometimes selfish.  
> Occasionally self destructive.
> 
> And prone to very brief,  
> yet severe, spells of sadness.
> 
> But I would fight until   
> every bone in my body  
> was broken to protect you.
> 
> That’s a promise.
> 
> — Beau Taplin

Nondescript jeans, straight-leg and medium wash, ancient Adidas, and a green University of Miami sweatshirt, autumn-leaf-auburn curls poking out underneath the hood. Marisa Cruz’s dossier states that she’s a recent grad, who’d attended on a basketball scholarship and turned twenty-two only a month ago, but right now, her hands are clenched in her lap, knuckles white, and if she bites her lower lip any harder, she’d draw blood. She has the height and statuesque build of an athlete, but that only emphasizes her fragility as she sits bolt-upright across from him as the small airplane makes its way from Florida towards Washington, DC. Nico can’t blame her, though, for the silence or the nerves. This particular flight is never a happy one for any who make it.

“Want something to eat, or drink?”

“No. No, thank you.” Marisa’s fists clench even tighter. The shadows underneath her green eyes are bruise-purple as she raises her gaze briefly to his face, a grimacing smile upon her own. “I HATE flying.”

Nico doesn’t see the point of mincing words, but returns her forced smile with an uncharacteristically-gentle one of his own. “I’ll stock you up on Dramamine, then. Unfortunately, you’re going to have to get used to this.”

She sighs and closes her eyes, a shuddering breath escaping. “I’m going to have to get used to a lot of things.”

A new home, a new phone number and email address, a new name on a new driver’s license and a new social security number. Twenty-four-hour protection. Waking up sweating and screaming, gunshots echoing in her subconscious, the blood-spattered faces of her parents frozen in death, branded to the insides of her eyelids. A single tear tracks its way down one pale cheek, almost as though she has yet to completely cry herself dry.

Nico tucks the dossier away and reaches the short distance across to lay one hand on her tightly balled ones, and keeps it there until he feels her fingers relax– roughly ten seconds before the plane begins its descent.

*-*

Marisa Cruz attends the orientation for joining the Witness Protection Program with a stoic face as the details of her new life are explained to her. She will relocate and enroll in grad-level classes in a completely different field than her undergraduate studies. At no point is she to contact any of her old friends and any remaining family members. In time, she will be expected to testify against the drug cartel boss who had murdered her parents, after which she will disappear.

It’s all old hat to Nico, but something about her– fragile and solitary and intrepid as a wild rose blooming amidst a mess of thorns– stirs an undefinable feeling of tenderness that he’s certainly not accustomed to feeling. Later, they sit in the windowless room, drinking cokes from a vending machine, and he smiles at her.

“Pick a name that’s going to be easy for you to remember. Some people like to use their same initials.”

She finishes her soft drink. The highly-identifying University of Miami sweatshirt is gone, and one pink tank top strap slips down her shoulder as she wings the empty can into the wastebasket across the room with impressive accuracy. Nico’s eyes trace the graceful movement for a moment, but then meets her emerald gaze.

“My grandmother’s name was Marcela, though my grandfather always called her Marcelita. I think I can go with that. Marcelita Cross. Maybe Lita for short. Will that do?”

“Perfect. Lita Cross, my name is Nico Hernandez, the US Marshal assigned to your protection.” His big hand swallows her smaller one, and finally, _finally_ , she cracks a faint smile over their clasped hands. “It’s nice to meet you.”

*-*

Despite the Dramamine, Marisa Cruz– now Lita Cross, is still tense and white-knuckled in the seat across from him during the flight out of Washington, so Nico fills the silence with his own words.

“So, what did you go to school for? Aside from basketball, obviously.”

“Electrical Engineering, if you’ll believe it. I was gonna go work in Silicon Valley like all the cool kids, retire by the age of thirty-five with a gazillion dollars, or something.” There’s a hint of an ironic smile on her lips, and that’s better than nothing, so Nico smiles back.

“Eh, it’s overrated. I’m from California, originally, and the cost of living is outrageous out there. When I came out to Virginia at the start of my career and got my first apartment– a decently sized one-bedroom, too, in Crystal City– I almost wept with joy. My apartment in Cali was about the size of a shoebox, and the rent was triple.” His smile widens and he adds a cheeky wink. “Naturally, being a shallow asshole, I do miss the beaches. And burritos. And In-N-Out.”

“Where did you go to school, then?”

“Stanford. I was an athletic scholarship kid, too,” he reaches over and takes her hands, gently pries her fists open. “Track and field, though. Mainly, it was cool because I can say that I went to the same school as Dana Scully from the X-Files, who holds the distinction of being the first woman I ever loved. Aside from my mother and sisters, that is. I think I have a weakness for tomboyish redheads.”

She rolls her eyes, but her fingers relax fractionally in his as the sunlight streaming in through the airplane window glows golden against her ruddy hair.

*-*

Lita Cross attends a different school than Marisa Cruz had, and lives in a cozy two-bedroom apartment on campus with a roommate whom all of her new female classmates have agreed upon as man-candy of the best tall-dark-and-handsome variety. She has no social media of any kind. She’s enrolled in the culinary arts program, and wears her bark-brown hair in a ladylike ponytail and knee-length dresses that show off beautifully toned, tanned legs. She’s friendly enough with the other students and is known to like flowers and chick flicks.

The nightmares wake her up more often than not in the beginning, and in the first, agonizing weeks, several times a week, she’d shoot up in her bed, cold sweat matting her hair in dark streaks to her neck and a scream choking in her throat, shivering despite the southern warmth as a large male body bursts into her room and silently holds her as she sobs, dark eyes bleak and sympathetic and endlessly patient as they wait for her to finally drop from exhaustion. She sleeps with the lights on and feels ironically ashamed at the taxpayer dollars that went, every month, towards her astronomical electric bill.

It is about a month and a half into their acquaintance that Nico hits upon a solution.

A few nights a week, always during the wee small hours, the two of them go to the twenty-four-hour gym an hour’s drive off-campus and play an exhilarating and sweaty hour of one-on-one basketball in a deserted indoor court, with nothing but the fluorescent lights overhead bearing witness. They always get home at roughly three in the morning, and then follow up the basketball with a kickboxing lesson in the living room, and then, more often than not, scrambled eggs hastily devoured over the kitchen counter before they’d had the chance to cool down from smoking. These nights would always be before days that she didn’t have any morning classes, and it would be approaching dawn when both of them would finally crash, fully dressed, in her bed out of sheer exhaustion.

Eventually, in an organic, unplanned progression, he sort of abandons his own bedroom altogether. It’s not sexual– they’re always dressed and nobody’s hands wander. She just sleeps better with a warm, muscular, protective body lying in between her and the bedroom door.

In the locked drawer of the nightstand on her side of that bed is the one photograph of her parents that she was allowed to keep. He pretends not to know that it’s there and always looks away when she takes it out.

In the locked drawer of the nightstand on his side of that bed is a loaded Glock 22. She pretends not to know that it’s there and always looks away when he takes it out.

*-*

Lita finds herself enjoying culinary school more than she thought she would. The long hours on her feet don’t faze her, and she finds it a rather fascinating duality of precision and creativity. She often brings home leftovers and experiments of all kinds, some more successful than others. Nico democratically and enthusiastically demolishes all of them, but has an especial fondness for desserts, particularly cookies.

“I don’t know why you’re not like, six hundred pounds,” she teases him one evening, as they watch a football game on TV and he plows his way through a generous serving of coq au vin and half a dozen chocolate macarons. There’s a crumb by his mouth, and she reaches across the couch to swipe at it just as the game cuts to halftime and commercials. Out of the corner of her eye, she sees him set down his plate, and then his hand– large, tanned, surprisingly elegant despite the roughness of his fingers, snags her wrist, his touch warm and achingly gentle.

“Exercise and good clean living,” Nico says lightly. “PT for the job is no joke, at least to the guy who trained me. Guy by the name of Elias Priest. Had one of those faces and smiles like a Catholic saint, but appearances can be deceiving, you know?”

She traces her fingertip over the crumb by his mouth, and his skin is warm like the air in a Thanksgiving kitchen. Stubble is coming in, brushing his chin and jaw with sand-papery dark brown. He’s a man’s man and loves sports and documentaries and napping on the couch, but he listens to everything she says– her fears, her memories both happy and horrible, her pet peeves and stupid things she’s seen on the internet– like his investment in her life extends far beyond keeping her breathing until the court date. He had taught her how to throw a punch and use a taser, and holds her in her sleep, even though she keeps the lights on and tosses and turns. She doesn’t realize that she’s leaned forward until suddenly she can count every one of his eyelashes, which have no right to be as long and dark as they are, but he’s the one to bend his head. Firm lips brush against her hair, then press against her forehead, and she’s sure that she’s blushing wildly despite the innocuousness of the touch. It’s not where she’d like it to be, the sudden thought occurs to her, though she’d never, ever admit that aloud. He smells like chocolate and her girly-smelling fabric softener, though it’s incredibly different on him.

The game on TV is well into the third quarter before she manages to turn her attention back to it, but somehow, that hand around her wrist doesn’t leave, and his fingers entwine with hers.

*-*

The driver’s license bearing the name Marcelita Cross is issued by the State of Georgia as opposed to Florida, and states that the bearer’s birthday is the 12th of May, so the fifth of December that year dawns uneventfully like any other day. Lita comes home to the distinctive grinding sound of the blender whirring away in the kitchen, and curiously goes to investigate.

Nico smiles as she walks in, even as he pours something pale green and frothy into two cocktail glasses rimmed with salt. “All in all, we can say this is just another day, yeah?” He has a dimple in his right cheek but not his left when he grins, and there’s a small gift box somewhat clumsily wrapped in floral gift-wrap on the counter next to a grocery-store bouquet of flowers in a plain white vase. “I made margaritas. They’re the only girly drink I know how to make, I’m afraid– I’m more of a beer kind of guy.”

Shocked green eyes meet his dark ones, and her breath catches in her throat. Wordlessly, she reaches for the drink, but her cheeks flush even before she takes a sip, and her fingers tremble as they carefully unwrap the box. Nestled inside against snow-white satin is a pair of earrings shaped like pink rosebuds. She puts them on, and smiles tremulously at the gleam of approval in Nico’s eyes. She drains her glass and half of a second one before she finds the courage to step closer to him– Nico-the-protector is so much easier to understand than Nico-the-closest-friend-and-more– but when she leans up to press her lips against that solitary dimple and he wraps his strong arms around her like it’s the simplest thing in the world, it’s the most perfect thing she’s felt.

And yet, in some strange and subtle way, it seems to herald yet another change in her life. A quickening thrill. Elation and despair intertwined. The warmth of his body cradling hers and the dread of the trial, set to begin in a month.

A beginning. An end. The beginning of the end.

It’s as though Nico feels it too, though, because all of the sudden, he sets down his barely-touched drink with a quiet clack and she feels him bury his face in her hair, and his breath is hot but not quite even against her neck.

“Do you know, I’ve been doing this for quite some time? Most people who go into witness protection are criminals who turn informant. Kind of sleazy types– the villain who helps the good guys bring down the bigger villain, if you will.” He pulls back just enough to look into her eyes, and the shine in them, so different from the numb flatness of their first meeting, causes his breath to hitch. “Not like you. No one’s ever been like you.”

There’s no good that can come out of this conversation– it ends with a one-way plane ticket to some small town in Wisconsin that she’s never even heard of before, where the name Marisa Cruz means nothing to anybody, and life will go on, perhaps peacefully and uneventfully but in sepia-toned anonymity and solitude. All at once, for the first time in months, her eyes fill with tears, and she burrows back into his arms as they start falling. He rubs her back and rocks gently and there’s probably something ridiculously incongruous about the tableau– fruity tropical drinks on a cheap Formica counter, a jewelry box, a weeping young woman with red-copper roots showing under her tousled brunette hair, a dark-haired man holding her protectively, a gun holstered at his side. And maybe it’s because she presses her wet cheek against his stubbly one, close enough that he can taste tequila and lime on her breath, or maybe it’s because her hands are clenched white-knuckled again, this time around fistfuls of his shirt, and he knows that in the morning there will be dark-purple shadows underneath her eyes again, but a moment later they’re kissing, devouring each other, and he sinks his grip into her hair and she sinks hers into his heart and both of their mouths taste like salt—margarita and tears.

Nico pulls back first, and his eyes blaze like dark fire as he stares down at her. “We can’t, not like this.” His voice sounds as though he’d swallowed something a lot rougher than citrusy cocktail, and in his eyes, Lita reads an echo of her own despair. “I’m falling in love with you, but I can’t compromise your safety. If something were to happen to you, it would kill me.” His Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows, his chest rises as he takes a ragged breath. “I’ll come back for you, though. Someday, when you’re safe, and this is all over. I swear that, on my life.”

The day’s date means absolutely nothing, according to all of Marcelita Cross’s documents, but a birthday is a year older and wiser, no matter what anyone says. And so she nods, slowly, gingerly, with the meticulous care of someone trying not to break. She leans up, and when her lips meet his this time they’re soft and sweet and slow as a requiem. They don’t break apart until they need to breathe, and then, deliberately, she finishes her second drink and his, letting the alcohol cushion the blow to come.

She’s dimly aware of him carrying her to bed, then lying down next to her, holding her close under the covers. But she wakes up the next morning alone, and when she walks into the living room, there’s a different marshal. A sharp-eyed blonde with a pixie crop who introduces herself as Harper Tennyson and whose sardonic smirk doesn’t at all resemble Nico’s smile. But at least Harper asks no questions, and lets her cry herself to sleep in peace that night.

She doesn’t see or hear from Nico again, not when the trial is finally over, not when she completes her culinary program, not when she gets that one-way plane ticket. But at the oddest times in the subsequent years, she’d receive a dozen pink roses from the local florist. They match her favourite earrings perfectly.

*-*

The town of Menomonie, Wisconsin, dawns cold and snowy on the fifth of December, and Lita Cross quietly bids farewell to her coworkers at the restaurant where she’d been working for the past six months as the pastry chef and makes the short trek to the local neighbourhood bar. It’s a quiet weekday night, and she seats herself at a small table in the back, content to watch a basketball game in silent progress on the TV screens.

Marisa Cruz would have turned twenty-seven today, had she still existed.

A cheery cocktail waitress walks over to her table, and sets down a pale green drink in a distinctive glass, and Lita’s head snaps up in surprise.

“I didn’t order anything.”

“Oh, it’s from that gentleman over there. He said to tell you he really likes your earrings.” The waitress gestures a broad back at the other side of the bar, sculpted shoulders brushed with dark hair slightly too long, and as Lita watches, wide-eyed, everything else around them seems to stand still as he turns around, one dimple in his right cheek as he slowly walks over. He’s wearing a black pea coat and jeans and looks nothing like a US marshal as he reaches her table, but it’s the same warm hands, the same smile, and when he wraps his fingers around hers, it’s like everything slowly falling into place with the same quiet loveliness as the snow outside.

“What are you doing here?” Lita manages to ask in a surprisingly steady voice. Her testimony at the trial of the cartel kingpin years ago had resulted in a conviction and she had been out of true danger for quite some time, but just now, she felt brave enough to take on the whole wide world.

“I moved out here a few months ago. You know why I’m here,” Nico tips her face up, staring at her as though unable to get his fill of her face. His stubbly cheek presses against her smooth one as he whispers into her ear. “Happy birthday, love.”

She picks up the glass that the waitress had left on the table and takes a sip, tasting icy, salty-sweetness on her tongue, and clenches her fingers around fistfuls of his coat, and grins. “Do I get a present?”

He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a small, clumsily-wrapped jewelry box in floral paper, and the hint of nerves in his eyes gives away precisely what might be in the box. “Why don’t you open it and see?”


End file.
